Vowels Are Free has arrived in its fancy prototype version. The game was originally playtested with scavenged Scrabble parts. This iteration was created via The Game Crafter. It includes 4 letter racks, 5 felt draw-string bags, 4 players' letters, vowels, and a timer.

It seems that wooden letter tiles are very hard to find and expensive when you do find them. They are popular among scrapbookers and others doing crafts. As a compromise I've used TGC's shards; 0.75" square cards. The advantage is I'm able to print on both sides, so each player has a distinct back for sorting tiles. The disadvantage is that they are only the thickness of a playing card, so they may be difficult to pick up and move.

Other than that, I have found one issue. I ordered a 150-second timer. In hindsight, that seemed too long of a time limit. When I tested the timer, it actually runs closer to 2:45, so that seems way too long. I've updated to a 2 minute timer for future editions.

I'm sure there will be other kinks to work out. Now that I have this spiffy new version of the game, hopefully I can find people to play it.

I've noticed something since getting the prototype for I Thought There'd Be Zombies!, and I wonder if others have experienced the same thing. I feel like the quality of the production has stymied rapid development of the game.

With After the Fall I spent a fair amount of time making the early prototypes decent looking and playable, but they were not very expensive or high quality. I used printable business cards for the cards and printed paper for the mats. The counters were Smarties!

The game progressed very rapidly, changing with each play test, sometimes drastically. I did spend time on the graphic design as the game changed, but the components themselves were disposable and felt that way--easy to replace. Usually each play would have several (if not all) new components.

To some extent Archon Arena went through a similar lifecycle. Early prototypes were business cards. Often I'd simply write changes on them rather than reprint the cards. After ordering real cards, the gameplay has changed much more slowly. The second set of cards basically just reflected a redesign of the layout, and very little has changed since then.

Maybe it's just the natural progression of game design. As the game gets more concrete, the prototypes get better, therefore, there are fewer and fewer changes. The key then is to time the quality of prototyping properly to coincide with the level of completion of the game.

With I Thought There'd Be Zombies! I feel like perhaps the good prototype came too early. The game is fun as is and certainly playable, but I continue to second guess basic elements of it. It'd be a lot easier, mentally, to make drastic changes if it didn't involve throwing out a $10 game board and/or $20 worth of cards.

It'd be great to hear from anyone else who's had experience with this phenomenon. Is it just me, or can high quality early prototypes virtually kill a game?

Despite the title, I don't have any cut and dried rules for good communication when commissioning artwork. There are some things I've done wrong though that might help out others to avoid the same mistakes.

1. Know your dimensionsWhen I first calculated the size of the box for Archon Arena, it was smaller than the box size I ultimately settled on. This meant I had written 1500x1200 in the contract when I really needed 1800x1125. That difference in aspect ratio made a big difference in the artwork. For awhile we went back and forth with me trying to get things moved farther apart before I realized he was working off of different dimensions.

2. Communicate the detailsSo far, for me it's been great when I'm able to ask for something very specific. For example, I wanted the warrior's hands to be farther apart so he looked more ready. I asked and quickly received. In other cases where I've been able to communicate the details, I've gotten what I was looking for. When I've had only a vague notion or been unspecific in my requests, things have taken longer or not come out as I wished.

3. Let the artist be the artistI've previously discussed how having too specific of a vision in mind can make it difficult to get what you want. In most cases remember that the person you've hired has a lot more experience and training in art and design than you do. Give them some free reign and you're likely to be pleasantly surprised.

4. Be upfront about moneyI felt like I was being overly burdensome on my artist. I didn't want him to be upset or feel ripped off by the amount of work I was asking for with revisions. I stated upfront that I understood this and would give him extra if he thought it was appropriate. (He kindly rejected my offer.) Hopefully this way we will both end up satisfied by the transaction.

For me commissioning art has been a learn-as-you-go experience. The lessons I'm getting in the school of life will surely serve me well going forward as I require more art. Hopefully they can help you too.

After the excitement of making progress toward the finished game wore off, I began to admit to myself that the artwork being commissioned isn't going to fit my vision. There are things I like about it, but overall the style is not realistic enough, and the colors are too dark.

As they say, if you want something done right, do it yourself. I can draw things that I'm looking at, just not things from my imagination. So, I decided to take my photo mockup, find a better warrior image, and draw a new sketch myself. The result you see above.

The good thing is it looks how I envision it. The bad thing is I can't really do any more. I've never really done a full color Photoshop. In fact, I don't even have a copy of Photoshop to use. My thought is now I can ask an artist to ink, color, cleanup, and correct this image rather than make a new one from scratch.

Obviously I fell into the trap cautioned against in the Commissioning Illustrations document linked to earlier. My expectations of a certain image have made me disappointed in what I'm receiving. We'll see how the new plan goes. Hopefully I can get the artwork done without wasting a whole lot of money or more artists' time.

Two milestones for Archon Arena were passed today. First, the other day an artist stumbled into the chatroom on TGC looking for work. He was willing to work very cheaply, so I decided it was worthwhile to give him a shot. After being stiffed by two other artists (they offered services and then ignored me when I tried to commission them), I was a little leery, but it has been a good experience so far. The big milestone today is he sent me a preliminary version of the cover art. It's a bit different than my original vision, but I knew it would be. He still has some more to finish, and he's willing to take suggestions, so I'm very optimistic.

The second accomplishment with Archon Arena is that I uploaded the first tutorial video. This one is exactly 3 minutes long and goes through the initial game setup. I shot it quickly using my iPad's camera. I didn't expect much, but the quality turned out to be acceptable, so I went ahead and edited it and put it out. I put it on Vimeo because YouTube really annoyed me. I won't go into that now. Maybe another blog post to rant. :)

Via Board Game Geek's forums I just found this excellent guide to commissioning art. The author of the document, Randy Gallegos, kindly released it with a Creative Commons license, so I'm able to post it here for your enjoyment.

If you don't have time to read the whole thing, or want to get a taste of the contents, here is a summary of the important points.

The Project Triangle: There are three variables for most any type of project: fast, cheap, and good. You can (at most) choose two of the three. Don't expect to find a great artist who is inexpensive and able to work fast.

Realistic Expectations: Remember that artists want to create. Try to see their work for you just as you looked at their other work, with few up front expectations. "Once you wed your mind to an image beforehand, you’re more likely to be disappointed."

Dollars and Sense: Going along with realistic expectations, keep in mind the salary an artist has to make to survive. Factor in how long your piece will take to create, and you can calculate a fair price.

Know Your Rights: This section explains the aspects of intellectual property licensing. A key takeaway is that you can potentially save money by less restrictively limiting the timeframe, geography, and/or types of media in which your commissioned art can be sold to others.

Vintage- Not Second-Hand: With all the art that has already been created, consider licensing existing art instead of having new pieces commissioned. This can save you a lot of money.

Actually Commissioning Art: This section summarizes much of the information about and adds bits of added advise.

A Finished Project: The author suggests similarly hiring a Graphic Designer to ensure that the great artwork you've acquired is set in equally great design.

If this summary has whet your appetite for more details, go ahead and download the file linked above. It's a good read and extremely helpful for the new indy publisher. As it says toward the end, "Congratulations! You officially know more now than every small-press client I’ve worked with, coming into their project." So check it out, and you will be educated too.

Our search for artwork is underway. Finding a great artist to bring a game's vision to life is not just important, it's essential. Good artwork will literally make the difference between a game being adopted or it withering on the vine. How does one go about finding a suitable artist?

Putting an ad in the classifieds is probably not going to yield many results. You need to go where the artists are. Online, one such place is deviantArt. Thousands of pieces of art are uploaded to the site daily. You can browse people's portfolios and find the style of art that you want. Then place an ad in the forums. A ton of starving artists will likely respond within minutes. This is the phase I found myself in earlier this week. As I weed through the candidates, there are a few things I would have done differently up front.

First, as I said, having found a number of favorites first is important, so you and the artist share a frame of reference of what you expect. To do this you need a free account. Fortunately, I set one up a few years ago. I imagine some people would be turned off by a "newbie" coming on looking to hire.

Another key is to have what you are looking for as detailed as possible up front. Many artists are leery of giving a set price since the amount of work can vary considerably depending on the details. It's frustrating to get a lot of responses and not have prices, so there's no way to really compare or budget. Also, one thing I initially overlooked was specifying a commercial license. Some people charge differently than for personal pieces.

Archon Arena box cover mock up for artist hiring

A big important item is to be prepared for record keeping. You will want to be organized from the beginning. Check out a respondent's portfolio. If you don't like what you see, ruthlessly delete their response. Keep a list of the best candidates and try to nail down exact quotes. Realize that many of the people are in foreign countries and might have limited English. Try to communicate simply and directly.

To deal with all the hassle I was encountering, I ended up making a page on this website. It lists all the commission details, including mock ups of the expected artwork, and it has a form for the applicant to fill out. They have to specify what job they're interested in and, importantly, list a price range. All the responses are nicely arrayed in an online database, so I don't have to do a lot of the record keeping. I wish I had done this right away.

All this being said, I haven't completed the whole process yet. I'm sure there will be some more snags along the way, but maybe my experience so far might help someone else make their first steps toward getting that artwork that's just right. Or if you have other advise, leave a comment.

I Thought There'd Be Zombies! actually came a few days ago. It was printed and shipped faster than expected, so I was pleasantly surprised. Hearing the mail carrier ring the doorbell was like being a kid on Christmas morning!

Though I'd unpacked the game and looked at everything, tonight was the first time I've had a chance to play "the good version". Unfortunately, I made two errors in ordering. The first was not a big deal; I forgot to get pawns and a box insert. For pawns we just used D&D figures. The second problem was more serious. I forgot to change the quantity of rubble empty cards from 1 to 7, so instead I ordered blank empty cards. It's still playable--we just use the existing cards and call the rest of the spaces empty--but the oversight was annoying.

With the near production quality prototype the game played well. The cards fit nicely in their spots. The chips I ordered are a good size and thick enough to be manageable. The board is great. It looks just like a "real" game. There is virtually no seam in the quad-fold board when it is unfolded. Considering I did all the graphics in a few hours, I think it turned out quite well.

And a great thing about tonight's playtest, we found a couple points to clarify. The rules had seemed pretty solid, so it's good to find a bug or two to let us know we're still working. :) Now I just have to get more people to play. We haven't done a four-player game yet, and the balance might change things considerably. Overall, though, the game has progressed nicely, and I'll be happy to pull this prototype out on game days to playtest further.

I got my software problem sorted out with a curt but timely email reply from Kinemac's tech support. With that out of the way, I started working on the animation for part of the Archon Arena video series.

The idea of this video is to give a short overview of the cards, their types, categories, layout, and iconography. First it shows the five card hand and the five types of cards, Weapons, Armor, Spells, Potions, and Maneuvers. Then it shows the icons for offense and defense. And finally we see the Magic/Melee/Special categories.

I've already "written" most of the accompanying voice over in my head. Hopefully, my friend with the radio voice, Carter, will be able to read it for me. Then the timing of the animation will have to be tweaked to match, and it will be all set!